Malte Schöning’s AIDA Turns Memory, Sea Crossings and Sleepwalking History into a Harbingering Folk Lullaby –

If Malte Schöning became the voice of his generation, this era’s levels of empathy would reach heights great enough to address the sickness we’re sleepwalking through and maybe even prevent history from repeating. His standout single, AIDA, which opens the recently released EP Erste Chance, crosses cultural boundaries with enough visceral, emotive force to obliterate them and remind us that compassion shouldn’t be constrained by colour, creed, or continents.

The Hamburg singer-songwriter has taken his songs from busking spots to festival stages across Europe, yet AIDA carries the directness of someone still singing to real people rather than faceless crowds. That immediacy matters because this song bears witness.

The gentleness of the fingerpicked melodies works in aching juxtaposition with the stridency and restrained fervour in Schöning’s imploring, passion-lined vocals. Written from a true story and shaped by an encounter with a Holocaust survivor, AIDA preserves a memory while forcing the present into view, drawing a line between the child who fled the Nazis and those still fleeing across the sea today. The message that “Never again” applies to all people, lands with devastating clarity. With the English version on the way, this harrowing Euro folk lullaby looks set to prise eyes wide open even further. I couldn’t think of another song more worthy of going viral

AIDA is now available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify. 

Review by Amelia Vandergast